This invention relates to a telemetry apparatus for reading utility meters such as gas, water and electric meters. Sometimes, these meters are located inside buildings or other enclosures which make it difficult for the meter to be read manually. More often, the meters are accessible but are simply located a considerable distance from the street. Therefore, a meter reader must spend a considerable amountof time reading a single meter. Especially in residential areas, it is often necessary to park the reader's vehicle in the street, walk down a driveway and into the park of a residence, read and record the meter data, walk back down the driveway, get into the vehicle, travel a short distance down the street and repeat the entire process. Utility companies keep careful statistics about the cost of manually reading meters and, based upon the savings to be realized, often adopt practices such as reading meters at longer intervals to reduce the number of visits required to a particular meter. However, this reduces the cash flow of the utility company since the gas, water or electricity is not paid for by the consumer for a longer period of time after it is used.
To eliminate this disadvantage, many utilities read meters only once every two or three months but, in the interim, interpulate from previous readings and send estimated bills based on prior usage. Then, when the meter is read and the actual utility usage obtained, the bill based upon the actual reading is adjusted to take into account the estimated billings of prior months. However, this practice has historically caused a considerable number of consumer complaints based upon perceived variations in monthly billings which do not apparently coincide with actual utility usage. Since the expense of reading meters must obviously be born by the consumer, the inefficiencies inherent in manual meter reading are utlimately reflected in higher utility rates.
For this reason, numerous proposals have been made for alternating the reading meter process by permitting the meter to be read from a remote location. Some of these proposals require making electrical and/or mechanical connections between fixed and portable units such as, for example, by plug and socket devices which are susceptible to tampering and environmental deterioration over a period of time.
Other proposals involve transmission of the meter readout by wire to a central orifice by use of utility or telephone wires. However, these proposals require a substantial up-front capital investment by a utility company which would be reflected in higher rates and therefore opposed by consumers. Proposals have also been made for transmitting a meter readout by radiant energy which is received by a portable transceiver which includes means to display and record the information received. However, prior art devices of this type have, to date, been themselves expensive and susceptible to a variety of difficulties such as the inability for them to be read manually if required and the ability to detect evident of tampering.
Also, to reduce the capital investment required to install such a system, it is essential to make use of existing meters.